Now that we’re talking public restrooms in OB …

OCEAN BEACH, CA. Last week it was announced that the North Beach public restrooms would be closed for 18 months for reconstruction, as the roof was falling apart.

Any talk about public restrooms in OB would be incomplete without a discussion of the restrooms in the main lifeguard tower at the foot of Santa Monica Avenue. These facilities have been wanting for years.

There are no seats – so, in order to change into a bathing suit or wetsuit, you take your life in your hands, and try to balance yourself against the damp wall, switching feet in order to minimize getting your clothes wet, as the floor is constantly soaked – no mats there. Meanwhile, the smells and sights are not for the light-hearted.

In the men’s room, there are two sinks, two urinals, and two stalls. The urinals challenge your olfactory senses, and the stalls themselves are forbidden territory.

The women’s restroom is only slightly better. Still, no seats, no mats, no extra frills. They do have two sinks, however. The only shower is outside.

Ocean Beach was promised a new lifeguard station a few years ago. And as the public restrooms are in the same building, they would need to be built as well.

The following photos are not for those easily placed into squeamishness. But these are what ordinary natives and tourists alike see and experience. (Click on the image for a larger photo – if you dare!)

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I actually have been around long enough to remember the old life guard station before they built this one. So, to me, this is the new lifeguard station. Larry OB, correct me if I’m wrong (you seem to have been around just as long) but wasn’t there a place to buy cokes and candy on the outside of that old station. I definitely remember buying candybars and sodas from someplace in an old rickety wooden, 2-story building right there on the sand, and I think the upstairs was the lifeguard station.

OB Joe – I do too, but will await Larry OB’s thoughts. In the meantime, rest assured that I will be traveling to PB and La Jolla for some comparison photos of their nice restrooms. Watch this station for this shocking juxtapositioned photo montage.

this sucks. the city’s really dropping the ball with this……especially since theres all this talk of spending hundreds of millions of dollars on new projects downtown. What about the beaches ? Ya know, the place where all the tourists go when they come to san diego? seems pretty backwards to me.

Not really sure why Lane keeps getting ripped by Shawn in this blog. Lane’s a good dude who’s never deserved elementary school style jokes about his parents.

Shawn, I have no beef with you but do wish you’d leave it alone, it’s simply not funny. Perhaps you could treat folks a little more “rad” as your last name suggests, it’s a pretty good feeling when it comes back around ;)

I’ve used many different outposts around the city after surfing, and none of the men’s are a whole lot better. PB’s is newer and cleaner, La Jolla Shores is pretty foul, (I usually sneak into to hot showers up at Scripps when I’m in that area), south Mission next to the jetty is a lot like OB. I don’t know how old these restrooms are, but they all need an upgrade. From what I hear the woman’s are not quite so disgusting. I guess women don’t piss on the floors so much, and put toilet paper in the toilet. Yea men are pigs, no news there…

Thanks Frank. I cant wait for the companion shots. These bathrooms are some of several public infrastructure projects that will never see the light of day not to mention get off the ground until it becomes obvious that the City has a red ass for OB! I mean how much neglect are we going to accept from our public officials (and general public for that matter) before we get not only some new bathrooms for Chrissake but the new lifeguard station, the new library and the new firehouse? Throw in a widening of SS Cliffs at the Entryway, more COMMUNITY park acreage, historical preservation, a public safety center…and you have a shopping list. But we’re told to reject the “SOCIALISM” of the general welfare in favor of some invisible hand when we enter the market. Well… the market is selling corporate welfare for the real estate industry and gentrification of our communities as ersatz redevelopment. Maybe when they’ve forced O’Bceans to live in Klantee, La Mesa or some such east of 5 bung hole & made the neighborhood “safe” for the $tar*ucks drinking, Land Rover driving cool will OB get some of the public infrastructure that’s been long overdue. But by then it’s… “WELCOME TO OCEAN BEACH… trendy n’ tidy” From the bottom Santa Bohica Avenue, Danny Morales (30)

18 months to reconstruct a bathroom? you’ve got to be kidding me, right?

I say remove the bureaucratic red-tape, hire 5 out-of-work local OBcean construction workers (I’m sure an open ad would bring them out of the woodwork in droves), pay them a fair wage, and watch it be finished in 3-4 weeks. What on earth could possibly take the City 18 months to complete such a simple project?

Who’s head is in the sand here? Or should I say, who’s head is in the broken toilet?

Hi Sunshine,
I’m sure that those city employees must have many meetings in order to 1st form a committee, then do a 12 month study, hire a consultant, then do another 12 month study only to find out that the city doesn’t have the funds to allocate for the project…pretty sure that’s how things work downtown…other than that I hope you’re enjoying the last day of Summer. :)

18 months, I’m told, is a good sign. That means there’s money for the project and the city will act on it. Yeah, it seems like a long time. There’s designs to draw, and other hoops to jump through, before the actual construction would start – and that should only be 3-5 months.

Still you gotta admit 18 months is kind of a sick joke. It isn’t like they are thinking about should they do it- tourism is our #1 industry and the #1 attraction is our beaches despite the attempts via the alcohol ban to make the lifeguards and law enforcement’s jobs “easier” by discouraging those pesky large crowds.
Sadly we accept government stupidity and malaise as the normal situation.
I know they do have to comply with ADA requirements, they should extend that compliance all the way to the ocean itself. Wheelchair friendly swimming zones, dammit. Steel must float here!

Frank, that must be a typo in your first line…should be North not South…right?

The salt water taffy joint that OB Joe is remembering was on the footprint of the current parking lot next to the lifeguard station. It was a large building often called the merry-go-round building, but it was a used furniture store when I was a kid…or maybe it was the storage building for a furniture store. The take out window for candy and food was on the South side of the M-G-R building….right next to the lifeguard/police station (a small jail.) The Western side of the merry-go-round building had a raft rental business in the mid sixties. We didn’t need to build beach parking lots until the late sixties and early seventies. More one car families, fewer apartments…etc.
Old Saratoga Norm used to practice saxaphone in the old lifeguard tower restroom. He also showed me some photos once of the devastation of the great storm surf of 1939? Asphalt torn up a block deep on Newport Avenue. Looked like OB was hit by a bomb. Amid the jumble of the timbers…the old lifeguard/jail station and the merry-go-round building were the only things left standing close to the beach.

I believe that merry-go-round building had a m-g-r in it during the World’s Fair in SD in 1915 or 1916. There is a picture of that m-g-r in its place in OB in the m-g-r building in Tilden Park in Berkeley, where the signage reports that “the merry-go-round in Tilden Park . . . [where I took my little girl almost every Sunday back in de ’80s man] was the same merry-go-round that had been part of the World’s Fair in SD” so many years earlier, and remained working in OB for quite a few years after; I believe it spent decades in mothballs before being refurbished in Berkeley. I have no idea of the process but, Larry that is great knowledge!!
Any OB historians know more?

Hey Shawn- ‘Cause you don’t get to see any of the profits generated from Iraq and Afganistan doesn’t mean they dont exist. Did you ever think of taking your store of talent up the food chain to a higher class of persons? For a guy with all your wit and wisdom there might just be some “room at the top” Dont you agree ragsters?… or am I just miffed because S.Con/Rad burnt me for the excerpt from Dallas?

Dickie
That is indeed the same merry go round in Tilden Park that was in OB.
I did some research at one time and have more info filed away somewhere.
From what I recall it came down from the Riverside area. Was in OB, then put in storage somewhere up in the LA area. Then taken to Berkley and restored. It has a historic designation.
I’ll try to find my notes and post info later. I did see it in action on you-tube.
Hows things up north in the Redding area? I was raised there for some time.
We left San Diego in about 1961 moving to Oakland. Dad was stationed at the Oak Knoll Navy Hosptial.
We lived there for about 5 or 6 years . A heavy time in Oakland with all the racial riots and what not. My grandmother lived in Richmond she owned an apartment building there. She watched buildings burn around her. Eventually her tenants quit paying rent and she lost it(the building).
When Dad retired we moved up to Redding thats where he used to hunt and fish.
So we went from big city Bay Area to a rental house out in the sticks. We had a rifle range in our backyard. We then purchased a home in Enterprise thats still in the family. I graduated from EHS class of 1975. I still have family and friends there. I haven’t been up for a visit since we moved my father down to San Diego after the loss of my mother a year or so ago. I hope to visit sometime in the near future but it may not be until my 35th high school reunion next summer. What area do you live in?
I’m not sure what all this has to do with the merry go round but there you go.

Pat, I live in Burney . . . 54 miles from Redding, and about midway between Mt. Lassen and Mt. Shasta, on both of which I spend wonderful time hiking and occasionally snowshoeing. OBragsters are welcome to visit. Ellen and I love city guests and we both have OB histories. Ellen is a teacher and would love to meet a former area student (!) . . . she hasn’t been here 35 years but close enough. So Pat, if you do come up for your 35th reunion let me know. And if i come to OB in December or January like I hope, I will look for you to encourage you. Where is the still-in-the-family home?

“rifle-range in our backyard” . . . yeah this is definitely gun country . . . what with the teabaggers and all the” proud rightwing terrorists” around here fantasies of a shotgun ( a very defensive weapon) dance in my generally peaceful head . . .

There are actually autumn leaves up here . . .

I’d love to hear more about that merry-go-round . . . a major player in my parenting years . . .

Dickie
I know Burney well one of my good friends lived up there.
Known for beautiful Burney Falls one of my favorite places to visit when I’m up there.
My family home is in Enterprise off Churn Creek Road even though it’s only about a 1/4 mile off I-5 it is/was pretty countryfied . When we first moved there ,there were deer,coyotes,wild turkeys,rabbits,all kinds of wildlife. We have a couple acre pasture and where surrounded by fields . It was pretty cool growing up there , we spent a lot of time in the woods. In the last few years they have been developing the area. Housing to the side of us and a shopping center slated for the area behind us where the Kenworth Trucking center is/was. We had a store for many years in Enterprise my mother ran it . It was James Gangs Shirt Creek we had quite a few good accounts up there. We would print shirts in OB and ship them up there.
I met you at the reunion of activists in 2000 in OB I went to most of the events to document history with my video camera.
I’ll let you know when I’m up that way.
Look forward to seeing you sometime in the future.

While I’m as cynical as anyone about all that stuff I think the situation has become more that they have to review, review and double review this stuff to cover their own asses from accountability in case of the slightest screwup, even by someone else.

Pat, I definitely remember you . . . I remember we talked together on the “walking tour” of OB activist sites, and you taking photos of the soon-to-be demolished house at 5155 Muir Street which right wingers (with forebearance from the FBI) shot into knowing it was a houseful of OB activists. One young woman was wounded in the attack. I also remember you saying that you wish you could get the siding panel with the bullet hole still in it!! . . . did you?

Wow, Enterprise. I don’t know exactly where your place is, but most of that east side of town, at least north of Cypress Ave., is mainly big box stores, strip malls, and asphalt parking lots . . . esthetically and planning-wise a real nightmare. But once beyond that . . . I just love that whole area. I frequently drive out of town on Old Alturas Road which goes through a lot of the old semi-rural neighborhoods before connecting with Rte. 299 (New Alturas Rd?) on the way up the hill.

I’m sure we’ll meet again . . . please do let me know if you come up.

. . . and just to get back on the thread . . . go OBTC, fix those bathrooms . . .

In her book, Beach Town, Ruth Varney Held says the Merry Go Round, first called the “Hippodrome” was built in 1918 by O.F. Davis. The building later housed a recreation center in the 30’s and 40’s, then J.J. Noels Furniture store, and a hamburger stand. She says it was torn down in 1965, and the spot is now a parking lot.

So the History tells us the parking lot and the lifeguard tower wern’t built as a unit. The mid sixties parking lot took up most of the available space. Then when the old lifeguard tower was torn down (about 1980??) the present lifeguard tower was built on the same small footprint. That meant very little space devoted to restrooms…very short sighted. I don’t think there was time for public comment. The chain link just went up one day, and workers told us it was going to be “remodeled.” Old Saratoga Norm was skeptical. He thought the wrecking ball was coming, so we took some B&W 35 mm shots of the exterior. Frank, that’s something else that needs to be found in Norm’s archives. The old lifeguard tower might have been constructed using plans from a church, because it looked like a church with a blunted steeple (for the solo lifeguard to sit in.) It was the vaulted ceilings that gave it the accoustics favored by the bathroom musicians (that Bob Oaks devil music crowd.)

Frank…around that same time (1980??) Norm and I shot 2 rolls of 35mm stills of the devastation of the last stretch of wooden boardwalk that ran from Newport over to the pier. We also shot the cliffs from the pier to Santa Cruz Street, because of the pending “Sunset Slopes” project. The photos might conatain some of the last vies of the Santa Cruz caves and the “Round Beach” that was filled in so the condo could have enough real estate to put in their swimming pool. The OB Historical Society would probably like to get those B&W negs some day.

Okay…okay. I know some of you still want to know about the Merry Go Round. I checked Ruth’s book, and as it turn out, Ocean Beach was once big enough to support two Merry Go Rounds. The South Ocean Beach MGR went to Belmont Pier near L.A. about 1927. She says it burned down about 1929, but she doesn’t specify whether she’s talking about the pier burning, or the Merry Go Round itself.

The North OB (Wonderland) MGR went to Coronado Island, and then to Balboa Park near the entrance to the zoo.

The Mission Beach MGR at Belmont Park was built in 1925. She doesn’t mention what became of that one. Belmont Park stole our thunder, and marked the beginning of the end of OB’s “resort era.”

Back to bathroom issue….as I mentioned in another story, we lost a bathroom under the pier. It was never replaced. You can still see the concrete slab under the pier. I think the city should mitigate that loss by putting a yurt-style of restroom in the pier parking lot (the kind of restroom we currently have by the skate park in Norht OB.) We can get rid of the police trailer in the parking lot, and put the new restroom right there in its place. We now live in the internet/cell phone era…the police community trailer is a dinosaur. We should have that pier parking lot restroom in place before we even think about tearing down the South OB lifeguard tower and restroom.

Likewise…the showers at the lifeguard station should be relocated to the SW corner of Saratoga park before we even think about tearing down the South OB lifeguard tower. We need to plan good transitions.

Larry OB – okay another historical dispute. I believe the “new” lifeguard station/ restrooms were constructed in the mid-sixties – not 1980ish. The “old” lifeguard station can be seen in those old B&W’s on Steve Rowells’ website. I don’t have the site on me, but Pat James I believe gave it in a comment to another post.

Larry, Frank
Steve Rowells web site is oceanbeachphotos.com
I was wondering if the Norm you were talking about is the Norm that lived at 5130 Saratoga?Steve said he used to have a printing press in his place.
His picture is the 4th one in gallery #4 on Steves web-site. is that the Norman you where talking about?

Larry-OB, Just try to pry that “police” trailer of the 4 parking spaces at the foot of Newport and you’ll get more resistance from the OBMA than is warranted. Why?…because the OBMA (who rents the trailer from Berts) uses it as a rest stop for the parking enforcement officers who arent allowed in any of the OB businesses…you figure.

I checked out the bathrooms on the way to the Obrag meeting tonight. I peed. I wiped. I flushed. I lived to tell the tale. (And besides, the gal in the next stall said I had “flair) As Caesar wrote veni, weewee, vici….

Save the public bathrooms…because there sure as hell wasn’t an alternative “facility” that I could track down. (Library- closed; coffee shop- closed; bakery- iffy& no parking…) Women & anyone with a kid will understand. We gotta hold it for 18 mos.????

Rating: 1 1/2 sheets of single ply toilet paper out of a possible 4. ( I was freaked out when my pants hit the floor, but on the other hand I left with a view of the water out there. Yes.)

I can’t nearly match Larry OB’s historical reviews of the lifeguard station facilities, however I’ve been at the same location down here in the 5100 block of W. Pt. Loma since I guess ’93. (when it was called “the war zone”) I think I’d been here a year or so when the well known incident of the bale of pot in the North beach bathrooms occurred. (some bales of pot were dumped by a smuggler pursued by the coast guard, they only rounded up a few of them and of those that got away one washes ashore in the predawn darkness, some homeless guys find it and drag it into the men’s room.) Must have been a lot of “medicine” in that bag because half the day went by with many people let on to the find on the “QT” discreetly stopping by the bathroom and stuffing what they could conceal on them and scurrying away, before the cops were tipped off about a substantial remainder and seized it, to the chagrin of those who heard just a bit too late. (me!) A next door neighbor had a small backpack filled and in OB good neighbor tradition, shared some gratis. She said the whole thing was a good karma day, with nobody guarding the “community property”, and the people she saw also picking up their gift from King Neptune weren’t greedy and at no point did anyone think to drag it all away for themselves or even profit.
Probably just as well because by today’s standards it wasn’t too special or potent, but just its origins as the gift rained down from the skies, the pot at the end of the rainbow, or the one that got away, whatever you like- made it kind of special.
Re:Storms of ’39…. Danny I believe also lives near Wonderland and knows its fate.
It might be noted that we haven’t had a real El Nino winter in about a decade or more here. We had 2 the first few years at this location for me, and as I understand it my rented duplex and the two next to it may be the lowest elevation in the zip code? Both seasons saw multiple storms with the typical El Nino downpours of like 2 inches per hour JUST stopping as the water had flooded the street to car window level and the water starting to slosh above the door sill at the living room. I’d seen photos of 70’s and 80’s storms with a couple of various factors thrown in- one year the city didn’t do any maintenance on the palm trees, the wind blew the numerous tree parts into the streets, clogging the storm drains and the water stayed on the street all the way downhill. To the lowest point in the zip code. Row boats in the streets, I seen the pix!
So the next year we’re looking at another big storm and I’m on the sidewalk with neighbors from both sides, as dark clouds roll in, we’re going over mental lists, got a shovel out cleaning the crud out of the whole block’s drain grating, looking at a pitiful supply of sandbags, (I’m thinking plywood cut precisely to door and window size with inner tube rubber gaskets for the next year, surely futile) and up walks an older bearded guy, I guess you’d call “griseled”. Or a bit tipsy, but sound enough of mind to not dismiss.
“You kids need to get the hell out of here, for you own safety”
“Huh?”
“I lived here about a decade ago, when the big one hit” (could be one of many)
We told him we were ready, sandbags, flashlights, I had a floor jack and big jackstands to keep my then late model Corvette high and dry.
“I didn’t think much of it, and went to sleep on the couch ” he said.
“the rain started like usual, then really came down in buckets like only an El Nino does. Only it didn’t stop like usual. After an hour I am half dozing on the couch and there is an inch of water in the living room. I get up and look for my shoes, and within ten minutes of that the house and every one like it on the block is chest deep in water and if you can’t swim you might have been dead. I just saw the storm prediction on the news and felt the need to return here and tell you. When the waters subsided the line on the wall was at 56 inches.”
As that was the height of all the rotten drywall I’ve had to replace when repainting in the years I’ve lived here, and saw said line on beams inside, this is the truth.
I remember the guy who’s building the castle next to me that will tower over the block told the planning commission (arguing for an underground garage) in the years he’s been here the parking lot’s stayed dry through every storm. He came here in 2001 and not a single El Nino in those years. FEMA must know that, they denied the garage. They cut down the center jetty years ago, presumably so if the high tide coincided with a heavy rain, the spillover from the river goes into mission bay, not the dog beach parking lot and our homes. This still does not preclude a problem with the drains or the rainfall heavy and long enough to overwhelm them.
Just a thought to stir up the discussion, before the day the rains come again.
(Danny, were you here when they removed that jetty to witness the great rat exodus? They trapped hundreds of feral cats, their only predator, and removed their habitat. We were overrun! Every night at sundown a mass of rats crossed the streets from the remaining jetty into the neighborhoods to feed!)

don’t know if you saw the sign on the castle fence that appeared last weekend. the artists rendering of chateau le monstrous leaves the two homes on each side looking like those tool sheds the Depot sells for a couple hundred bucks, what an insult. noise isn’t so bad except when they removed the old slab.

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